Thursday, August 21, 2014

Animated Heat Mapping

Thanks to CartoDB's Torque library we are now used to seeing markers being animated on a map to represent changes in data over time. By adding and removing markers according to a time stamp the Torque library can be used to visualize relative intensity over time, such as in this Twitter map showing, News of Ferguson on Twitter,

By not removing markers once they have been added to the map the Torque library can also be used to show the accumulation of data over time, A good example of this is this animated map of 72 hours of seismic activity in Iceland, Bárðarbunga - Last 72h in 10 Seconds. This map does not remove the markers once they have been added to the map so that a picture of where the most seismic activity has occurred emerges as the animation plays.

Real-estate data analysts Illustreets have taken yet another approach to mapping the relative intensity of geographical data over time. Their new map, London House Prices: Evolution Over 13 Years, visualizes the cost of property in London over 13 years by providing an animated heat map of property prices in London boroughs. As the animation plays the colors of each of the London boroughs changes to show the evolution of average house prices in each borough over the 13 years.

This Illustreets map also superimposes an animated line chart over the map, which plays in conjunction with the animated heat map. You can select any of the London boroughs from a drop-down menu to view an animated line chart comparing the average house price in the borough over the 13 years compared to the average London house price.